3 Comments:

Most of these frightened comparisons to Los Angeles seem to be talking about the Los Angeles of 1970. Many don't realize that the city is very quickly transforming itself into what may be the model for urban density for this century. I grew up here and love the city but never saw this coming, great time to be living here.

I feel like a recently read an article to that effect but I can't recall where. I should have posted something about it.

also not sure I actually agree with you, but its worth debating. coming from ny, los angeles seems like the most ecologically unsustainable city I've ever lived in. not sure that provides a great model for urban density to other cities.

you won't get a debate about that from me. I was being neutral about it, Los Angeles could easily become a third world city if transportation problems aren't dealt with. That's not to mention racial tensions growing without solutions even being considered.

What surprises me is that we are undergoing such a shift in residential preference to higher density. Zoning and transportation changes have lead to it, but it seems to have taken on a life of its own.

I now expect the neighborhood I grew up in, middle class Orange County, to be the slums of the near future, abandonded by a shrinking middle class moving back to city centers to avoid increasingly expensive commutes and to return to the sort of density city planners now know humans prefer.

I say it is a great time to be living here because the cultural conflicts about to be expressed in this change will echo large through the future and I am here to watch, and maybe influence. I think you would agree about that?